Day 20: Shrimp Alfredo and Chipotle-Inspired Bowl

Another day, another variation of shrimp Alfredo pasta. I purposefully made it different from my last shrimp Alfredo so I wouldn't post the same thing twice on here. By now, the addition of kale should come as no surprise. I do still have more kale left! I was out of garlic on this day and that definitely made a difference; I thought this pasta wasn't as good as my last shrimp Alfredo. As always with recipes I mess up a little, the one I provide will be how it should be done, not how I did it. Recipe is for one serving.

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup rotelle
• 1/4 bunch kale (or however much you want, honestly) shredded and removed from stems
• 5 large shrimps (or more, if you're using smaller shrimps)
• 1/4 medium yellow onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup whole milk
• 1 tablespoon butter
• Trader Joe's Alfredo limone sauce to taste (around 3–4 big tablespoons should be plenty)
• A squeeze of lemon juice to taste
• Salt and pepper to taste

Steps

1. Cook the pasta. Save a cup of pasta water.
2. In a preheated pan, melt the butter and sear the shrimp until pink. This only takes a few seconds per side!
3. Add garlic and onion and sauté together for a little bit, until the onion is half translucent.
4. Add the pasta. Stir to mix.
5. Add the sauce, milk, and pasta water a little at a time, tasting as you go and checking the consistency.
6. Add salt and pepper to taste.
7. Stir in the kale. Cook for a few more minutes until the kale has died down a little and is vibrant green.
8. Finish with a little bit of lemon juice. Enjoy!

For dinner, Vamsi was craving Mexican food. While he was browsing GrubHub for options, I had the genius thought that I could probably create something resembling a Chipotle bowl with the ingredients I have on hand. Note: there is rice underneath all the toppings, you just can't see it in this picture. It was incredibly easy to assemble, and there is a lot of room for adjustments depending on what you do or don't have. I thought I had black beans (I don't eat beans but Vamsi does) but I didn't, so I just left it out. Did I mention this is vegan? I added cheese later but everything in the picture is vegan. Recipe serves two.

Ingredients

• About 2/3–1 cup rice (can be white or brown — preferably long-grain, though I used short-grain)
• About 4 leaves of lettuce, shredded
• 1 small can of Herdez salsa casera
• Trader Joe's soy chorizo (I used about 1/3 of the package and it was more than enough)
• About 2/3 cup of sweet corn kernels
• About 1 cup bell peppers (I used frozen pre-sliced, but this is equivalent to about one medium bell pepper)
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• Cheese (optional — I added grated parmesan on top, but you could also do shredded mozzarella, three cheese mix, pepperjack, whatever)

Steps

1. Cook the rice.
2. Sauté the bell peppers in a preheated pan with a little bit of canola oil. Don't use too much oil! We're gonna add soyrizo to this in the next step and Trader Joe's Soyrizo is already oily.
3. Add the soyrizo and cook for a few minutes. The Soyrizo package says to cook until the temperature is at 165 F, but what does that even mean? Also, if there is no meat in it, do I really need to do that? If you overcook Soyrizo it will dry out fast. Just cook until it is pretty hot, then remove and set aside.
4. In a clean pan, add a little more canola oil and add the corn. Sauté for a little bit until cooked. How do you know if it's cooked? I just eat a couple and see.
5. When the rice is done, put everything together in a bowl. You don't really need more salt because the Soyrizo is already heavily seasoned and you're also adding salsa on top. Enjoy!